Saints Aren't Angels

On Easter Sunday 1934 at Vatican City Pope Pius XI proclaimed to the world that a Piedmontese farm boy, John Melchior Bosco of Turin, Italy, was a saint of the Roman Catholic Church, a man worthy of emulation. International acclaim followed for this religious icon. He was the first and only religious designated “Father and Teacher of Youth”.

But ninety years earlier his story was totally different. The brash young cleric, beginning his priestly career in the fall of 1844, fought, tricked an...